Practice Long Deep Breathing or another breathing technique to prepare the body and mind for One Minute Breath. Description:

Maintain a straight spine, with the chin in, and the chest lifted up and out.

Inhale for 20 seconds

suspend/hold the breath for 20 seconds

exhale for 20 seconds

Don't hold or suspend the breath after the exhale. Begin inhaling again after completing the exhalation.

Breath slowly and deeply,

drawing air first into your lower, then middle, and

finally upper lungs so that the entire lung is participating.

Eyes:Closed

End on an exhale and resume regular, natural breathing

Take your time with this pranayama, building your way slowly to the full 20 second inhale/hold/exhale cycle. If you cannot do 20 seconds, then do 10 or even 5 seconds. Just be sure to keep the breath even, and inhale/hold/exhale for the same amount of time. Example: Inhale 5 seconds, hold 5 seconds, exhale 5 seconds.

Work your way up to 31 minutes slowly, starting with 3 minutes and moving up from there. If needed, intersperse periods of Long Deep Breathing with One Minute Breath.

Benefits:

Yogi Bhajan taught that breathing at the rate of one breath per minute develops cooperation between the hemispheres of the brain, brings the mind under control of the yogi, and builds intuition. Calming of Anxiety, fear and worry. Openness to feeling one's presence and eh presence of spirit. The whole brain works, especially the old brain and the frontal. Intuition develops.

One Minute Breath calms the mind of worries, and Yogi Bhajan also said that if practiced for 31 minutes a day a person can control all of the cells in their body, and if practiced for 62 minutes a day a person will have wisdom and stability.